Chapter 8: Conditions

The next day on the floor, she spilled coffee on her outfit. It wasn’t a horrible stain, considering the fluids she could have spilled on it. She went down to dinner without changing, and met Eric there. Now, if she had asked, he would have sent one of his minions to meet her and get that outfit washed. What she did instead was to wear the emergency outfit she had kept in her room for the next day.

That night she took the coffee-stained outfit home. She changed into blue jeans and put all her hospital whites into the laundry. She did a set of sheets, too, although she hadn’t had much wear out of that set of sheets. She went out of the coin laundry during the wash cycle to buy Christmas wrapping paper. She got only two rolls, although she knew that the family would all be opening their packages together on Christmas Eve in Minneapolis. She wrapped the five packages and got them all together in a mailing package during the drying cycle. She got back late, but not all the dryers were in use, and nobody bitched at her.

She got to bed late, though. In the morning, she dumped the laundry on the made bed and pulled hospital whites out of the pile until she got a matching set. She wore them to work and didn’t bring a spare. She did carry a spare set of underwear in a plastic grocery bag.

The day was a drag, and her lack of sleep didn’t help. Eric called to say that he wouldn’t meet her for supper. She got four calls during the night. Though none of them required her to go on the floor, she had a real sleep deficit that morning. The day was more of a drag, and she got home exhausted. She got her packages, drove to the post office, stood in line for a good hour, got them mailed, got to her car and back to the apartment. Then she had to sort clothes before she could go to bed. She fell asleep late. She dragged herself out of bed the next morning and managed to get to the hospital and up to the floor just before six. She hung her coat in the nurses’ space on the floor, remembering as she did so that she didn’t have a spare set of clothes upstairs.

She didn’t need a spare set of clothes that day, though she could have used a spare week of sleep. Eric met her for supper.

“Not the best day?” he asked.

“You could say so. I really got a lot accomplished on my nights off call, but what I didn’t do was catch up on my sleep deficit.”

“Well, if you got the things accomplished, then could I have the honor of your company tomorrow night?”

“Eric,” she said, “You don’t want my company in the state that I’m in.”

“Demonstrably false. You’re breaking the rules. Tell me what you want, and I’ll try to get it for you. You don’t tell me what I want.”

She thought. Her period was really drying up. She had missed sex, and Eric provided great sex, he could provide great sex the next night. No cunnilingus, though. She wasn’t sure she was that dried up, and it wouldn’t be fair to have him do it without warning him. And it was definitely none of his business.

“Well,” she said, “all right, with conditions. I’ll tell you later.”

“Any conditions. You’re in charge. You can tell me up until the time I must obey. One exception, though. Are you accepting another visit to my house? If not, I should tell Valerie beforehand that I won’t be there.”

Why not? At least she got to bed earlier when they ate there. She didn’t get to sleep when she got to bed, but the love play -- the sex play she meant -- didn’t go on any longer.

“You’d prefer that.”

“Yes,” he said, “but the question is which you’d prefer.”

“All right, with conditions.”

“I agreed to that earlier.”

“Yeah,” she said, “but I sometimes need to remind you.” He grinned at that. Eric had his bad points, but he could see his faults when they were pointed out to him forcefully enough.

She had, though, a night and a day to get through before that visit. The night was interrupted by two phone calls. One was serious enough that she had to come fully awake and think before she answered. Neither, though made her get dressed and come down to the floor.

She had a sleep deficit, but not a serious one, when she started the day. Then she was run ragged. She got to lunch at 2:30, and was called back from it before she was quite finished. She was leaving the floor late when Eric called. She got her parka from her room, but decided not to try for makeup.

He opened the door on her side when he saw her coming. He got in and drove to the exit onto the street.

“Give me your hand, your right hand,” Eric said when he had stopped waiting to exit the parking lot. When she put her hand in his, he brought it to his mouth. He kissed the palm, shooting heat from her hand all the way to the pit of her abdomen. When there was a break in traffic, he dropped her hand and pulled out onto the street.

“Eric?”

“Well, it was the only part that I could kiss right then. We don’t want to attract the guards again.”

“Then,” she said, “I want to kiss you, too.”

“Well, we’ll have to wait for a quieter time. On the other hand, the door out of the garage entryway opens that way. We can have all the time we want in there.”

“You’re always planning, aren’t you?” And he was planning to kiss her. Well, she wanted more kisses, and not just on her hands, either.

“Did I mention in that tour that the rooms are fairly soundproof, and the bedroom is nearly totally so?” Eric asked. “The door is solid, which is the weakest point in a lot of soundproofing attempts. So, while I’ll have to satisfy myself with kissing your mouth before Sparky is in bed, I don’t plan to limit myself so much later. Feel free to express anything you feel in that room.” He sounded smug, and damned possessive. She was less sure that she didn’t want to be possessed. At least that night she did. His kisses, however, would have to be restricted.

“Feeling possessive are we?”

“Anything of yours you want to move out at any time, I’ve told Madeleine to allow you. You have the key, and I’m not trying to hold onto them.” Now, that was a dash of cold water.

“Well, you know how limited my schedule is,” she said. “Do you want me to take them tonight?” She still had her case there, but she wasn’t sure everything would still fit in there.

“No! No! No! No-no-no, No!” He was pounding the wheel with his right fist, and she tried to remember whether she had ever before seen him without both hands on the wheel while the car was moving. “I don’t want you to do it at all. I hatched an elaborate plan to hold you to me by locking up your possessions. You have to be fond of that sexy dress. Then I saw that this wouldn’t hold you. I don’t want your body, as much as I love it. I want your heart.”

“Well, you can’t have even my body by locking up those clothes.” Sure she liked that dress, but she could walk away from it in a second. Walking away from Eric would be harder.

“You said that I was possessive.” So she had. She was less certain now that she found that possessiveness attractive.

“And,” she said, “to show how wrong I was, you told me about the elaborate plan you had to keep me prisoner. Since you’d abandoned it on the grounds that it wouldn’t work, that should demonstrate that you weren’t really possessive.” He laughed at that, and the laughter continued for a while.

“You shouldn’t make me laugh like that when I’m driving,” he said at last.

“I felt safer than I did when you were pounding the wheel.”

“I’ll try to restrain myself. Both restrain myself from displays of anger -- I was angry with myself, not you -- and restrain my possessiveness.”

“I knew you were angry with yourself,” she assured him. She had never been afraid of physical violence from him. Even when she’d had that silly picture of his locking women in cells to satisfy his needs, she hadn’t thought of his being violent.

His possessiveness, on the other hand, was a clear and present danger. Well, the very intensity of his present attraction was part of her protection. He would burn through that attraction fairly soon. Valerie was in greater danger. Eric was spoiling her now, but what would happen when what Valerie wanted was not another poster for her bedroom wall but a date to the dance? Worse, what would happen when she wanted to park after her date to the dance? Worst of all, what would happen when she wanted to marry somebody and leave Daddy all alone? That wouldn’t be Diane’s problem thank God. She’d be long gone from Valerie’s life before she had her first date. Still, she sympathized with the future Valerie.

And, too, when Eric’s passion burnt itself out, she would be safe from his possessiveness. What would protect her from her loneliness? She had missed him for these last few days. What would leaving him forever do? Well, with any luck, this would last through June. July first would bring hundreds of changes. The residency, which gave her many headaches, would probably give the benefit of delaying the inevitable time when he tired of her.

“Look,” she said, “I spoke of conditions. Stop at a drugstore on the way, will you? Preferably one where neither one of us will be recognized. I want to make a purchase.”

“Sure. Want me to make it for you?”

“No. To quote somebody I know, no-no-no-no. When a woman tells you she wants to make an unspecified purchase, you don’t ask her what.”

“Okay.” he said. “Interesting quotation. Anybody I know?”

“You definitely don’t know him.” Eric had less self-knowledge than anyone else she had ever met, maybe than anyone else in the world.

“Ouch! Well, there is a drugstore. Shall I park there?” He parked and she went in. She bought a package of six commercial douches. Her gynecologist had expressed negative opinion of them in general, but had acknowledged that there were times to use them. This seemed to be one of those times. She brought the paper bag back with her to the car, and Eric tried to hide his curiosity. He did that very poorly.

In the entryway out of the garage, she set the package down before Eric took her in his arms for a long, wet kiss. He held her glutes through the kiss. When they came into the living room, Valerie shouted.

“Doctor!” Valerie hugged her, and then ran to her dad to be picked up and kissed. “Why did you take so long after the garage door opened?” she asked. Good question.

“Daddy moves slowly sometimes. I brought you your favorite person to visit, you shouldn’t complain about how slowly I do it.”

“Okay.” But Valerie was as bad at hiding her curiosity as her father was. Of course, at one sixth his age, she had more chance of growing out of it.

Dinner was filet mignon. Dessert was hot-fudge sundaes. She was given her choice of having the hot fudge on vanilla ice cream or on chocolate. She stuck to vanilla, but Eric and Valerie went with the chocolate choice. She decided while watching Eric that she would be more adventurous when next given the choice. Then she realized how unlikely it was that she would ever again be given the choice, at least in this house.

Mrs. Grant cleared the table while the other three went into the living room. Valerie wanted to play a game of Go Fish with her and Eric. Eric tried to beg her off. Diane noticed that he didn’t try to get out of it himself.

“I’ll tell you what, Valerie,” she finally said. “I’ll play with the two of you until it’s your bedtime. At that time, you’ll go up with Mrs. Grant without any fuss. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“Is that a promise?”

“Promise,” said Valerie. They all sat on the floor to play. She had to wear this outfit for two more twelve-hour days, but she trusted Mrs. Grant’s cleaning. Probably this floor had less dirt than some of the chairs she sat on at the hospital. She had to be reminded of the rules, and the others were sharks at the game. She couldn’t muster much competitive instinct this late in the day. When Mrs. Grant came in, Valerie claimed it was a special day, and she should be allowed to stay up.

“But, Valerie,” Diane said, “I had your promise.” She got up -- slowly, she was no longer in shape for sitting on floors -- and went into the garage-entrance room to fetch her purchase. Valerie, thinking Diane was leaving, stopped her whining and went up with Mrs. Grant. Diane went up enough later that Valerie was already in her room.

She stored the douches in ‘her’ bathroom. She got undressed and into the nightgown and robe in ‘her’ dressing room. To be absolutely sure, she douched and then used the bidet. She went into the bedroom, took off the bedspread, stripped, and got into bed. She was nearly asleep when Eric came in.

“I think you really shocked her,” he said.

“Well, she has to keep her promises. Besides, I had something to hide. Disappearing was the best method of doing that.”

“Quite likely.” He hung up the pajamas he was carrying. He took off his robe, lifted the sheet, and slipped into bed.

“Look,” she said.

“I’d be glad to.” He put his hand on the sheet as though to strip it off her, and she had to put her hand down over the sheet to stop him.

“I have your promise, too. I said there would be conditions. One of them is no cunnilingus.” He didn’t look pleased.

“None? Ever?” he asked.

“None tonight. Next time will be okay.”

Eric said, “Okay.” He found the promise that there would be a next time more important than the limitation. He’d been afraid that she was weaning him off.

“As a matter of fact,” she said, “I have a sleep deficit. Maybe one time is enough for tonight.”

“Just tonight?”

“Tonight. I told you that you didn’t want me tonight.”

“And you were wrong,” he said. “Do I, at least, get a kiss?”

“Sure.” She puckered up, and he leaned over to kiss her. Soon, he moved the sheet down off her breasts and was kissing those.

Diane was tired and slower to arouse than usual, but he didn’t complain. As the heat spread through her, he returned to her mouth for a long kiss. She was ready for him, afraid that her orgasm would come from his finger alone, when his hand left her center to grab the condom.

“No,” she said. “I’m on the Pill.” Though she hadn’t actually started her second dispenser.

“Darling!” He moved swiftly. He was kneeling between her legs preparing her for his entrance when he stopped. “The Pill takes a month to be effective,” he said. Then, “Oh.”

“Yeah. This is my second month.” She wouldn’t have believed any male could stop when he had. He didn’t stop long, however. He pressed into her, opened her, widened her, filled her, stretched her.

Eric had two thoughts. The front of his brain was telling him what an idiot he was for telling a medical doctor a piece of commonly-known medical fact. The hind part of his brain was listening to the sensations from every nerve ending in his entire phallus.

She was warm against him and smooth. Her opening slid over him, and spread around him. She was slick around him as he sank deeper into her. So warm, so smooth, so welcoming. He was all in her and she was hugging him. Her nipples pressed against his chest. Her face showed her pleasure in being joined to him.

“Love,” he said. Then he started to move out again.

Diane felt his chest hair brush her breasts. She felt his legs flex between hers. She felt him press her into the mattress and ease back. She felt, most acutely, his penis stroking through her vestibule. The heat built again. She ran her hands down to his glutes and hung on.

Without the condom and its lubrication, she felt more friction, and that friction was more exciting. She shifted until his glans was rubbing her G-spot with every stroke. Her body was tensing, and her spirit felt her orgasm approaching. She started pushing up against his down strokes to bring it on. The heat filled her, overflowed out of the top of her head. She felt her orgasm just beyond some tissue-thin barrier. He was larger than he’d been before, and he thrust harder and pressed her deeper.

That broke through the barrier. Her spirit burst into flame, and she convulsed. She felt him hard within her vagina’s clasp.

“Diane!” he said. He drove against her harder and pressed her deeper into the mattress. She felt him pulse inside her, delivering his seed directly into her. “Love, love, love,” he was saying in time with his pulses.

Then he was gasping into her ear, and she was gasping, too. He was heavy on her for the longest time. He came out, and she felt a trickle follow him out and slide down her hip. He finally moved off.

“You,” he said, “are a constant delight. Sorry about trying to tell a doctor about medicine.”

“Well, I didn’t tell you before it was safe because I didn’t want you to try to pressure me. You wouldn’t have, would you?”

“That way, no. Seems to me, that you’ve been feeling a little pressure in other ways.” She took his hand in hers and kissed the backs of his fingers. What she felt was too complicated for words.

He had been a marvelous lover. He had thought of her safety at a point when she hadn’t thought that any male would stop without a gun at his head. He had apologized for not remembering her medical training first thing, though he had remembered it soon enough. She, on the other hand, hadn’t even thought that he had been an experienced husband. Married couples must know about contraception -- well, the sort of married couple that he had been half of.

He could be controlling and possessive to the extent that it would drive her up the wall, but he was responsible. He wasn’t some macho dude enforcing his will. Instead, he was a macho dude enforcing his understanding of her needs and safety. He’d get up before the sun did to get her to the hospital on time, but he wouldn’t break the speed limit or run a red light on empty streets to do that.

The drip was puddling in the inevitable wet spot, and it was becoming uncomfortable. She moved away from him to lie on a drier spot. She heard him chuckle. He turned off the light.

“Without the Trojans,” he said, “you get a wet spot. It’s smarter to make love on one side of the bed and to sleep on the other. Cuddling is messy otherwise.”

He was right. After missing his arms around her so long, she would have to sleep without them for one more night. She reached out above the sheet. When he felt her hand, he took it in his. With both the hard day and the sweet sex behind her, she fell asleep quite easily.

When she woke, however, it was in his arms. They were on her side of the bed, though. She ducked out the door and went directly to the bathroom. Not wanting to leak anything into the panties she would be wearing for the next day, she used both a douche and the bidet.

She needed to rearrange where her clothes were among her current three locations. Showered, dressed, with her Pill taken and her lipstick on, she carried her case downstairs.

“I’m not moving out,” she told Eric when she got to the kitchen. “Lift the case.” He did so. “Moving a bit more in, maybe. I have fewer clothes in more closets than anyone else I’ve ever met. I need them in different places.”

“Well, I wouldn’t have said anything.”

“No, but you would have thought it.”

He smiled at that, and she sat down to some delicious French toast. It was probably the first time she had eaten the same meal twice in his house.

“I’ve been thinking,” he said in the car. As usual when he drove, he was speaking towards the windshield though addressing her.

“I’m glad.” She shouldn’t be sarcastic, though. The man thought. Sometimes she didn’t like what he thought, but she couldn’t really deny that he did.

“You had to take about a week off for other business. Then you came back, and suddenly you are on your second month of taking the Pill. Y’know, I shared that bed with a menstruating woman for years. Well, not that bed. A little more than a year. We moved in late in Laura’s pregnancy, and nursing tends to delay the resumption of periods.”

“Does your over-careful use of words have anything to do with your being a CEO,” she asked. “Do you need the right words in a contract?”

“Legal takes care of contracts. It might have something to do with being a programmer. I can say to you to put some numbers in order, and you would. I have to tell a program to compare every pair of numbers and then switch the order -- a complicated process in itself -- if the second number is less than the first. Then I have to say go on to the next number. Programs, on the other hand, don’t try to change the subject.”

“Well, it is really none of your business.”

Eric winced at that. A woman’s periods were none of her casual boyfriend’s business. For her husband they were part of their common life. At some time, in the process of going from casual boyfriend to husband, a guy crossed the line to where it became his business. Obviously, he hadn’t crossed the line with Diane yet.

“Okay,” he said. “You don’t feel called to share that information with me. I’ll share some information with you, then. One, I have made love to a woman during her periods. It didn’t disgust me. I would be quite happy making love to you at such times. We could use the Trojans or not just as you please. I find that menstrual blood comes off easily in the shower. Two, I love to cuddle you. You may have guessed. If there is a reason that you do not want to make love, I’m capable of controlling myself while cuddling you.”

Diane thought of where they had ended up that morning. “Your liking for a cuddle is not exactly news. Did you like lying in the wet spot?”

“Well, that, too, comes off in the shower. As I said, there are ways of keeping us both out of the wet spot. The only nice thing that can be said for a queen-sized bed. But, as I keep trying to tell people, prioritize. Some things are more important than others. Cuddling is more important than wet spots.”

“Well, I’m glad you think so.” And, to be fair to Eric, he hadn’t even suggested that she sleep in the wet spot so that they could cuddle. “I enjoy our cuddles, too. I don’t, however, enjoy them so much that I’d miss a day at the apartment for them. I got my Christmas packages wrapped and sent during our vacation.”

She had him stop at her car, and she put the case in the trunk. Then he drove her the short distance to the entrance. The day wasn’t bad, as days on the floor went. Eric met her that night looking chipper.

“And how was your day?” he asked.

“Fairly good, all things considered. You look like yours was good, too.”

“Well, it was mostly brightened by the attitude I came to the day with. Murphy commented on how pleased I seemed to be starting the day.” Eric’s grin implied that the sex of the previous night had contributed to that mood. They could be overheard, and he was using innuendo. If she had been eavesdropping, though, she would have interpreted that easily enough. Well, she had dated and had two affairs in a college where everybody assumed that you were going to bed with every repeat date. Assumptions weren’t going to cause her any problems. And, too, ‘You would worry less about what people think of you if you knew how seldom they do.’

“I’m happy that you’re happy,” she said.

“Well, then you’ll be happier if you make me happier. Would you consider coming to dinner again tomorrow evening?”

“I couldn’t. I have things planned to do that night. Things to do quite alone.”

“In three days time, then?” he asked.

“With the usual stipulation that the days in between can mess me up. And with another set of conditions, an entirely different set. We’d have to start later.”

“Seven? It might be better if we skipped dinner at home, then. Restaurant?”

“That would be better,” she said. “Maybe not seven, and a place for hospital whites.”

“You pick it, or we go back to the same place?”

“We can decide then.” She might try another place if she had time to select it. If not, repeating a restaurant was no sweat. She ate all her lunches, half her breakfasts, and half her suppers here.

“Fine.”

“You’re so agreeable.”

“That’s odd,” he said. “Someone once told me that I was terribly controlling.”

“You are. Just not always, and the exceptions are surprising.” He smirked. Well, yes. Much of it was that he wanted to end up in bed. He would be happy with almost any path she chose if it ended there. That wasn’t all, though. If all his control had been trying to get her into bed, she could have dealt with it more easily. First of all, he wasn’t the first guy who wanted to get her into bed; that was something a girl learned to deal with before she could parallel park. Second, she was quite happy about going to bed with him.

His controlling went far beyond that. Take this evening, for example. He knew very well that she was going to go to bed alone. He didn’t even invite her for even-numbered days of the month. Yet he showed up here and bought her meal. He didn’t even eat with her, though she could understand that. Given the choice between Mrs. Grant’s cooking and the cafeteria’s cooking, she would have taken Mrs. Grant’s cooking any time.

Of course, what she’d eaten from Mrs. Grant had been heavy in cholesterol. That was part of its delicious taste, and the restaurant meals had been as bad. She could afford it for one meal, even two meals, in four days with the all time she spent walking in between. Eric, with that standard for three meals a day and a sitting-down job, was in more serious danger.

“Look, are the meals in your house as good when I don’t visit?” she asked.

Eric quirked his eyebrow but answered straight. “I think Madeleine takes extra care when you’re coming. Still, she puts on a feast morning and night. Sparky has different tastes, and she probably accommodates them for lunch when I’m not home.” Well, Valerie was not overweight for her height. She probably worked it off.

“Mostly, you eat eggs for breakfast?”

“Pretty much,” Eric said. “Two fried eggs when they’re not scrambled. She offered you soft-boiled, but those aren’t favorites with either Sparky or me.”

“What are your cholesterol levels?”

“Dr. Parker says I should watch them, but they’re not serious. I don’t remember the number.” No, he wouldn’t remember the numbers. The doctor’s job is to look at the numbers. The patient’s job is to change when the doctor tells him to.

“You might cut back on fats,” she said. “I’m not your doctor, but more fish instead of meat might be an improvement, and something other than eggs for breakfast.”

“Well, Madeleine buys lean meat.”

“That’s what they call it, and lean meat contains less fat than fat meat does. But ‘less’ doesn’t mean little. Fat is essential to human nutrition, and so is protein. Most Americans eat many times what they should of each, and -- frankly -- rich Americans like you eat more than the rest of us. Then, too, exercise burns up fat, but we don’t work like our ancestors do. Even I, and I’m on my feet twelve hours a day and walking half of that, don’t burn the calories that my peasant ancestors did in the thirteenth century.”

“Fat, yes,” he said. “But protein? I thought protein was good for you.”

“Protein is necessary for you. Water is necessary for the growth of wheat. You read occasionally about some place getting too much rain and the crops being destroyed by that. For that matter, you, too, can drown. Well protein is necessary for you. When you get more than you need, your kidneys work to break it down so it can be excreted. Your kidneys are probably strong enough to handle that easily -- probably. You have two, and you can get along quite comfortably on one. Still, people develop problems with their kidneys, and it’s not a good idea to stress them when you don’t need to.

“Anyway,” she finished knowing that she was poaching on another doctor’s patient -- and a fully practicing doctor’s patient while she was a mere resident -- within earshot of more doctors than were in almost any other single location in the city, “I’m not telling you anything your own doctor can’t and probably nothing he hasn’t told you. It’s just that I’ve seen what you eat regularly.”

“Well, this isn’t critical is it? I mean it isn’t time-sensitive?”

“No. Probably not.”

“Then,” he said, “you can tell it to Madeleine the next time you see her.”

“Sure.” She was conscious that she was treading on dangerous ground here. “Look, you have regular doctor’s appointments, don’t you?”

“Yeah. The outside directors insist.”

“Well,” she said, “more than your company depends on your health. I told you that you have two kidneys and could probably get by on one?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, Valerie has already lost one parent. She doesn’t have a spare if she loses you.”

Eric said, “Dr. Kleinfeld said the same thing.” He didn’t like to be nagged. He hated being nagged, especially about his health. On the other hand, Diane’s nagging sounded awfully like a wife’s nagging. It, indeed, sounded like Laura’s nagging had. The last bit of content was nothing he’d heard from Laura of course. She’d been likelier to portray how lonely she and Val would be if Eric died because he hadn’t exercised. If Diane wanted to be his nagging wife, he’d be happy.